Before dawn's early light: a weird night

The dinning room is dark, every chair turned
legs-to-the-ceiling on the long table-top rows. The glass
chink clatter of salt and pepper shakers hitting the tray is
the song of closing time.

It's 3 a.m. on a Friday night at Le Bistro Montage,
Fourth of July, and the guy lining shakers on the counter,
co-owner Josh Gibson, is a momentary holiday hero.

It's been a half-hour since he gave the go-ahead for an
early close: "Go home," he said. "This is
your reward for not killing me."

And it's been that much time since his remaining crew
called out lunatic cheers from the kitchen to a nearly empty
dining room in appreciation. On any other weekend night
they'd be hours from even thinking about wiping tables
and scrubbing stoves.

Consensus among the half-dozen or so employees busting to
get the place shiny and get themselves out the door:
"It's a weird night."

This was the first time in eight years that Montage was open
on Independence Day -- and apparently, not many people had
gotten the word.

Normally, it's another kind of weird at 3 a.m. under
the Morrison Bridge in Portland's favorite longstanding
and loud late night spot for post- partying mac
'n' cheese dinners, or oyster shooters, or
mudslides.

Normally, it's packed right up to closing at 4 a.m.,
every table full and more waiting outside the doors of 301
S.E. Morrison.

Normally, four line cooks are elbow to elbow in the blast-furnace kitchen heat challenging servers to get plates out to 140-some-odd after-hours diners as quickly as those plates are placed in the window....

Before dawn's early light: a weird night

The dinning room is dark, every chair turned
legs-to-the-ceiling on the long table-top rows. The glass
chink clatter of salt and pepper shakers hitting the tray is
the song of closing time.

It's 3 a.m. on a Friday night at Le Bistro Montage,
Fourth of July, and the guy lining shakers on the counter,
co-owner Josh Gibson, is a momentary holiday hero.

It's been a half-hour since he gave the go-ahead for an
early close: "Go home," he said. "This is
your reward for not killing me."

And it's been that much time since his remaining crew
called out lunatic cheers from the kitchen to a nearly empty
dining room in appreciation. On any other weekend night
they'd be hours from even thinking about wiping tables
and scrubbing stoves.

Consensus among the half-dozen or so employees busting to
get the place shiny and get themselves out the door:
"It's a weird night."

This was the first time in eight years that Montage was open
on Independence Day -- and apparently, not many people had
gotten the word.

Normally, it's another kind of weird at 3 a.m. under
the Morrison Bridge in Portland's favorite longstanding
and loud late night spot for post- partying mac
'n' cheese dinners, or oyster shooters, or
mudslides.

Normally, it's packed right up to closing at 4 a.m.,
every table full and more waiting outside the doors of 301
S.E. Morrison.

Normally, four line cooks are elbow to elbow in the blast-furnace kitchen heat challenging servers to get plates out to 140-some-odd after-hours diners as quickly as those plates are placed in the window....